ENTRY 7 Dinosaurs!!

In this entry we will discuss dinosaurs. I promise I am trying to keep my posts short and sweet, but I must profusely apologize in advance for this one….it’s long. But it’s intriguing! And there are lots of pictures….so hopefully that will help any reading strain I might be causing your feeble eyes…

So now, DINOSAURS!!!!

The story we have all heard from movies, television, newspapers, and most magazines and textbooks is that dinosaurs “ruled the Earth” for 140 million years, died out 65 million years ago, and therefore weren’t around when Noah and company set sail on the Ark around 4,300 years ago.

However, if we treat the Bible as TRUTH, then on Day 6 when land animals and man were created -- that would mean dinosaurs and Man existed at the same time!!

THEREFORE, dinosaurs would have also been on Noah’s Ark!

How did dinosaurs fit on the ark?

Wouldn’t they be too big?

Actually, the average dinosaur was about the size of chicken. The reason we only see the huge bones in museums is because they are impressive and draw crowds. Would you come to see a chicken-sized dinosaur? Obviously, they could become huge – we have their skeletal proof, but that doesn’t mean all dinosaurs were large or even started out that large as you can see depicted in the graph below. So, it is very possible that Noah had dinosaurs on his ark. He likely didn’t take the biggest ones, but he still probably had some on the boat.

But this might not be convincing enough to you. I get that. I’m just speculating, right? The Bible doesn’t even talk about dinosaurs….or does it?

Well, let’s back up and learn about the history of how we even found these exceptional beasts! During the 1800s several archaeological teams discovered the bones of some strange animals. The bones when put together formed some very large animal skeletons. No one really knew what to call them, so they had to be named! In 1842, Sir Richard Owen was the first to use the term DINOSAUR to describe what had been discovered. Dinosaur, which means, “terrible or monstrous lizard” was now a thing!

So, the word “dinosaur” couldn’t have been used in the Bible because it hadn’t been “invented” as a term yet. But what if what we call today a dinosaur had another name in Biblical times?

In Job 40:15, God says, “Look at the behemoth, which I made along with you and which feeds on grass like an ox. What strength he has in his loins, what power in the muscles of his belly! His tail sways like a cedar; the sinews of his thighs are close-knit. His bones are like tubes of bronze, his limbs like rods of iron. He ranks first among the works of God.”

Now in your Bible there is probably a foot note that says a behemoth is “possibly a hippopotamus or elephant,” but let’s read that one section again…. “his tail sways like a cedar”…does that describe the tail of an elephant or hippo?

What if we read this same passage but considered it was being written about a dinosaur? Maybe what we think of today as an Apatosaurus? Does this guy’s tail look like a cedar tree? Could he be “ranked first among the works of God?” Which animal do YOU think is described in Job 40:15? An elephant or dinosaur?

DINOSAUR/DRAGON??

Job 41 God describes a second creature:

“Can you pull in the leviathan with a fishhook or tie down his tongue with a rope? Can you put a cord through his nose or pierce his jaw with a hook? Will he keep begging you for mercy? Will he speak to you with gentle words? Will he make an agreement with you for you to take him as your slave for life? Can you make a pet of him like a bird or put him on a leash for your girls? Will traders barter for him? Will they divide him up among the merchants? Can you fill his hide with harpoons or his head with fishing spears? If you lay a hand on him, you will remember the struggle and never do it again! Any hope of subduing him is false; the mere sight of him is overpowering. No one is fierce enough to rouse him. Who then is able to stand against me? Who has a claim against me that I must pay? Everything under heaven belongs to me. I will not fail to speak of his limbs, his strength, and his graceful form. Who can strip off his outer coat? Who would approach him with a bridle? Who dares open the doors of his mouth ringed about with his fearsome teeth? His back has rows of shields tightly sealed together each is so close to the next that no air can pass between. They are joined fast to one another they cling together and cannot be parted. His snorting throws out flashes of light; his eyes are like the rays of dawn. Firebrands stream from his mouth; sparks of fire shoot out. Smoke powers from his nostrils as from a boiling pot over a fire of reeds. His breath sets coals a blaze, and flames dart from his mouth. Strength resides in his neck; dismay goes before him. The folds of his flesh are tightly joined; they are firm and immovable. His chest is hard as a rock, hard as millstone. When he rises up, the mighty are terrified; they retreat before his thrashing. The sword that reaches him has no effect, nor does the spear or the dart or the javelin. Iron he treats like straw and bronze like rotten wood. Arrows do not make him flee; slingstones are like chaff to him. A club seems to him but a piece of straw; he laughs at the rattling of the lance. His undersides are jagged potsherds, leaving a trail in the mud like a threshing sledge. He makes the depths churn like a boiling caldron and stirs up the sea like a pot of ointment. Behind him he leaves a glistening wake; one would think the deep had white hair. Nothing on earth is his equal – a creature without fear. He looks down on all that are haughty; he is king over all that are proud.”

What kind of creature does this describe? Many people think it could be a crocodile but if you read it again, I believe it is describing something we have come to believe is a made-up-fantasy creature….a dragon! Check out my highlighted portions and see if what is being described really sounds like crocodile?

If taken literally, these characteristics are not like those that belong to the modern crocodile. Skeptics point to this passage and say that dragons are a myth and therefore the book of Job must be a fairy tale. Or maybe, God was using poetic language when talking to Job. Honestly, I think God was trying to talk to Job in a language he understood. Using animals Job was familiar with so he could truly grasp what God was trying to tell him.

So, what do scientists say about this possibility? Could dragons or fire-breathing creatures have existed? Some scientists say YES! Just like stories of a worldwide flood are present in many cultures, stories of dragons show up as well. Scientists have found large chambers in certain dinosaur skulls that do not exist in the skulls of other living organisms that make them question what those chambers were for. Could it be a chamber that helped produce smoke or fire? Just like in our current bombardier beetle, there is a chamber that contains chemicals to produce smoke…couldn’t the same be true for these dinosaurs?

Many creation biologists believe that before the Flood, and for some time afterwards, dinosaurs (or dragons) and men lived near each other. There are also several examples of art or drawings in artifacts found in ancient societies that look like dinosaurs that we have displayed in museums today! How could people draw or carve things they had never seen?

Here’s another example found in the United States

Native American petroglyph under the Kachina Bridge at Natural Bridges National Monument, Utah

This petroglyph was discovered in 2012 just outside of Los Lunas, New Mexico. This particular petroglyph is called “Puff the Magic Dragon” and appears to be a depiction of a fire-breathing dinosaur

In the late 1800s, Samuel Hubbard, Curator of Archaeology of the Oakland Museum, visited an area of the Grand Canyon known as the Havasupai Canyon. As an evolutionist, he was amazed to find a petroglyph (carved rock drawing) of an elephant made by Native Americans. But another depiction was “cut into the sandstone much more deeply than the elephant.” Its height was 11.2 inches, with a neck approximately 5.1 inches in length and a tail of 9.1 inches. Hubbard photographed the petroglyph and eventually placed it in his scientific monograph Discoveries Relating to Prehistoric Man(1925, p. 10). What kind of animal is it? Dr. Hubbard believed that he had found an ancient drawing of a dinosaur. He wrote, “The fact that some prehistoric man made a pictograph of a dinosaur on the walls of this canyon upsets completely all of our theories regarding the antiquity of man. Facts are stubborn and immutable things. If theories do not square with the facts then the theories must change, the facts remain.” (Doheny, E. L., Discoveries Relating to Prehistoric Man by the Doheny Scientific Expedition in the Hava Supai Canyon Northern Arizona, 1924, p. 5.) 

Despite all this evidence, evolution still teaches that dinosaurs lived long before humans ever came to be. With this information, what do YOU think?

There is yet another question that most people ask….and that is how did ALL the dinosaurs that we know about today fit on to the ark? Although there are about 668 names of dinosaurs, there are perhaps only 55 different “kinds” of dinosaurs. Furthermore, not all dinosaurs were huge like the Brachiosaurus, and even those dinosaurs on the Ark were probably “teenagers” or young adults, therefore not as big.

Let’s talk about the number of dinosaurs though. In Genesis 1:25 it reads, “And God made the beasts of the earth according to their kinds and the livestock according to their kinds, and everything that creeps on the ground according to its kind.”

The word “kind” is key here. Creationist researcher John Woodmorappe has calculated that Noah had on board with him representatives from about 8,000 animal genera (including some now-extinct animals). When you realize that horses, zebras, and donkeys probably descended from the horse-like “kind,” Noah did not have to carry two sets of each animal. Also, dogs, wolves, and coyotes are probably from a single canine “kind” so hundreds of different dogs were not needed.

Often, evolutionists like to use dog breeds as proof that evolution is still taking place since there are so many breeds (labs, poodles, basset hounds, Chihuahuas, etc). But here’s the thing, they are all still dogs! They still bark, pant, chase cars, drool, tend to hate cats, and so on! If they were truly evolving they would be turning into something new, not maintaining their “dog” characteristics!

What I have presented in this entry is again HISTORICAL science. I truly believe it is solid evidence for the creation story and proof dinosaurs and humans existed at the same time, however, ultimately this also comes down to my worldview and my worldview is a Christian worldview.

I do hope you’ll take time to ponder what I presented here no matter your worldview. Is curiosity getting the better of you wondering what this ditzy blonde will type next? Or could this be the Lord working on your heart? Asking you to give His Bible and His teachings a chance?